


No Rest For The Weary

by taichara



Category: Final Fantasy I
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-11
Updated: 2014-05-11
Packaged: 2018-01-24 09:37:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1600169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taichara/pseuds/taichara
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Warriors of Light have barely begun their quest to restore the Crystals, and the basic realities of that quest are starting to wear on one mage's poor nerves.  Because, you see, not everyone is thrown into an adventure ready to deal with an adventurer's infamous bad luck with random encounters ...</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Rest For The Weary

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ukefied](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ukefied/gifts).



> Request 1  
> Fandom(s): Final Fantasy I  
> Request:  
> Prompt: Because trudging through the unforgiving wilderness, constantly under attack by monsters, will eventually get old. (Want something more specific? Think especially irritating wilderness: not tipping a canoe, searching for an oasis, being boarded in the middle of the sea...) General notes: I prefer twists on the old tricks--female warrior classes and male mage classes. Male White Mage/Male Red Mage is my fave, but I also love gen adventures, or grumbling about adventures, or playing with game mechanics.

In the vast and ancient forest that lay beyond and to the east of Cornelia’s newly restored bridge, two voices murmured quietly to one another …

“You know, Ajan, if I’m honest you’re the last person I expected to –“

“Hush, you, you’ll scare the game. Again.”

The cutting whisper slithered out of a mass of branches under which – if one squinted – the snowy woolen robes of a white mage could just barely be picked out through mud and moss. Deshe sighed, pulled his hat (its merry crimson liberally smeared with its own fair share of mud and greenery) lower over his eyes, and ignored Ajan’s irritable glare at his antics.

“No, but seriously …”

“I said _hush_. Now wait ‘til we see if there’s any that decided to show themselves … there! Now!”

No more than a short sprint away, three rabbits nervously poked their heads out of a break in the undergrowth and Deshe – feeling just a little foolish – surged up out of the makeshift blind in a shimmer of swiftly-cast magic. One misty Sleep spell later and the bunnies were out cold, Ajan stepping forward briskly to neatly, and cleanly, finish the job.

“Come here and help me field-dress these, you.”

“Do I –“

Strawberry brows crimped in annoyed warning. Deshe threw up his hands in mock surrender and, ambling to Ajan’s side, picked up a rabbit.

“Fine, fine.”

“If certain people hadn’t lost half our remaining supply in the bogs we wouldn’t have to be going through this to begin with, you realize.”

Deshe shrugged, smiling lopsidedly.

“If by ‘certain people’ you mean Khemi and Ahai, sure –“

Ajan grit his teeth on any real retort he could have made, reminding himself that it really couldn’t have been helped. Oh, the whole situation was aggravation piled on aggravation, sure; but Khemi was still good folk and a good mage. But spirits alive he needed to work on his nerves.

“… These plus the other two should do for a bit. Come on, let’s get back to camp.”

-*-

Camp, at least, was prepared by the time the pair of mighty hunters emerged into the tiny clearing with its fallen forest giant. A fire was merrily crackling away in it freshly dug pit, spits propped up over the flames; their precious sleeping bags were laid out neatly, packs alongside; and Ahai was leaning against the massive tree trunk with her blade beside her, steel rings pursed between her lips and a pair of crimps in hand as she worked on her chainmail …

_And there’s Khemi, ready to smite us, the horrible denizens of the forest. Of course._

Flapping the sleeve not being used to cradle dinner, Ajan pushed back his hood.

“It’s just us, Khemi, kindly don’t fry us where we stand if you don’t mind ~”

“… Ah, right. Sorry. Um, I was looking at the map we found …”

“You mean the map an insane magic broom gave to us.”

Ahai’s amused drawl prompted a startled jump from the jittery black mage.

“Ah, um, yes, that. Well, the map says that if we keep pressing eastward we’ll reach clear plains, more forest – not as large as this one – and then the free city of Pravoka. Hopefully we’ll, um, find a few more leads from there.”

Placing the rabbits next to the firepit, Ajan shrugged.

“I hope so.”

“That makes the two of us.”

Deshe’s hand came to rest on Ajan’s shoulder; feeling the tension there, he gave a reassuring squeeze and a pat before padding away to fish his own repair kit from his pack. Armour wasn’t going to mend itself.

“Just because we have these glittery things doesn’t mean I have any idea what we’re actually supposed to be _doing_ with them.“

“We’ll know what do to when it’s time to do it. Don’t ask me how I know that, I just –“

Ahai cut herself off abruptly as the surrounding forest erupted in angry growls. Eyes flashing, she snatched up her sword even as the pack of lupine assailants – their green-tinged coats marking them as werewolves, mainly, with two old-blood-furred wargs in the lead – burst from cover and lunged after their prey.

“ _Yeeaaauuuugh!!_ ” 

*CRACK* The air filled with the stench of ozone mingling with the campfire’s smoke and the sound of Khemi’s shrieking as he called a brilliant ball of Thunder down onto the head of the lead-most warg. 

For a moment Deshe considered scrabbling after his rapier but thought the better of it; Sleep, Sleep was a better choice – three of the werewolves sank slowly to the ground, the fourth and the wargs still afoot and howling. One beast snapped at Khemi, tearing dark robes and the tawny flesh beneath, before Ahai brought her blade down on its spine then spun away to lash out at its green-pelted subordinate (“Get the poison one dealt with –“) as Ajan stepped in to Cure the wound before it made matters worse. A softly glowing Protect spell followed fast on the Cure, even as Khemi launched another volley of Thunder that Deshe mirrored with his own between Ahai’s flashing lunges and the beasts’ snapping fangs –

By the time it was finally over the four were winded, blooded, and surrounded by lupine corpses and the remains of their camp. Ajan snorted, glanced around once, and swore.

“I am getting _tired_ of this.”

-*-

_I am so very, very tired of this._

_If we don’t see those signs of civilization soon I just may snap and throttle someone. Probably Khemi._

They’d been forced to move camp after the ambush – no surprise, really – and by some miracle had made it through an overnighting without more drama. Alas for Ajan’s equanimity and Khemi’s nerves, that turned out to be the last bit of luck the hapless Light Warriors happened to stumble across.

The very forest itself seemed to be working against them. More wolves of all varieties; scorpions, gleaming and clacking; fuzzy tarantulas the size of small ponies; _actual_ ponies, if one counted the inevitable crazy horses hell-bent on trampling and impaling them all … and then, then there were the worms. The damned gigas worms. Oh, how he hated them. At that, finally striking onto what remained of the Cornelia-Pravoka trade road did nothing to stem the tide of crazed fauna out for their blood; all it really seemed to accomplish, so far as Ajan could discern, was assure them that they were headed in the right general direction (which was a fair thing, he supposed) and then proceed to make their weary band a more obvious target to the packs of goblins alert and waiting for any travelers still rash enough to venture out onto the remnants of the road while the world fell apart around them.

Even Ahai was beginning to look a little frayed around the edges, pulling out her shard of crystal to stare into its depths more and more often as if looking for some explanation for it all. 

But then, finally – finally! – the foliage began to thin out, and there, beyond the last straggling stands of trees, could be seen Pravoka’s stout stone walls and, further off into the distance, its dockhouses and great wharves. Cracking a tired smile, Deshe caught Ajan in a one-armed hug and squeezed.

“Look, just another hour or two and we can finally throw ourselves in a _real_ bed –“

– Ahai snorted, rolling her eyes; Deshe ignored her –

“– but even better than that, we can finally get clean again!”

“Oh, I’m _all_ for that.”

Khemi’s muttering was barely audible from beneath his battered hat but no less heartfelt.

“Let’s make up that hour then, ah, before something else tries to carry us off.”

-*-

A sorry sight they were, dragging themselves dirty and dusty and bruised into Pravoka’s inn; but if there had been one thing that the incessant ambushes had been good for, it was topping off their traveling funds. 

(Ahai called looting the fallen ‘payment for their troubles’; the others were inclined to agree with her.) 

At Ajan’s irritable request the band paid for several night’s board and lodging and then promptly took themselves off to scrub, feed, and collapse into proper bedding for the better part of a day – and, after that and only after, it was time to replenish travel kits, stock up on as much antidote as they could afford, and check on any interesting available gear, new spells and local gossip that could point them in the right direction for their pressing, precious quest.

Which was, of course, how they found themselves getting swarmed by drunken, violent pirates.

Protect spell on his lips, Ajan could just feel the torrent of swearing ready to burst free.

_I really, truly am so damned tired –!_


End file.
